"The problem is the way it was written and implemented. We have too wide a net. We have too many people in prison. And we wound up spending - putting so many people in prison that there wasn’t enough money left to educate them, train them for new jobs and increase the chances when they came out that they could live productive lives," he said, according to a CNN transcript of the interview.

He approves of Hillary's recent commitment to back off from that stance. [More...]

Former President Bill Clinton is in town, campaigning for President Obama. At 5:30 pm, he held a campaign rally in Adams County, near Denver. At 7:30 pm, he will be at Denver's Manual High School.

On Thursday, President Obama will campaign in Boulder.

Sounds like a "Get Out the Vote" effort, since Denver, Boulder and Adams County are largely Democratic.

In Mitt Romney news, I just muted the TV. The same ad has come on twice in 15 minutes: an elderly woman talking about how Mitt gave the eulogy at her 14 year old son's funeral -- more than 30 years ago. That qualifies him to be President? It's sickening to see those making his campaign ads (in this case Crossroads) use this elderly woman and exploit her son's death. Is there anything Mitt Romney won't try and capitalize on? Mitt Romney: Capitalize and Privatize.

“I think I would enjoy it, but I don't think it would be a good idea…I'm already 63 years old, I hope I live to be 90…I love what I'm doing now and what I'm doing now is something that I'm uniquely qualified to do, whereas there are many people who could be good on the court.”

He also said both he and Hillary are too old to be put on the Supreme Court now -- not because they can't do it but because it would be better to pick someone with more energy in their 40's or 50's....meaning someone who will serve longer.

As to who Obama should pick:

“My advice to him would be to first of all see what the court is missing…The important thing is that you think they're smart and they're competent and they understand the lives of ordinary people. Now one thing I think he should think about is have we…gone too far in this process that assuming only judges can be elected? That somehow you're not qualified if you weren't a judge."

Today President Bill Clinton was admitted to the Columbia Campus of New York Presbyterian Hospital after feeling discomfort in his chest. Following a visit to his cardiologist, he underwent a procedure to place two stents in one of his coronary arteries. President Clinton is in good spirits, and will continue to focus on the work of his Foundation and Haiti's relief and long-term recovery efforts. In 2004, President Clinton underwent a successful quadruple bypass operation to free four blocked arteries.

John Podesta, who headed up the Obama-Biden transition team (currently of Center for American Progress) was part of former President Bill Clinton's Korea delegation to free Current TV journalists Ling and Euna Lee. Chris Nelson, described as "a veteran Washington foreign-policy watcher who covers Asia policy" says Al Gore was not an acceptable candidate for mission:

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton "always wanted to send Al Gore," Nelson continued, noting the two detained journalists worked for Current TV, a media company connected to the former vice president. "And apparently that was OK with Hillary and Obama, [whose wish was to] just get this out of the goddamned way."

"But here's where it gets interesting," Nelson continued. "I do not know how it was delivered. But 10 days ago, North Korea sent the U.S. a list of acceptable names. And I am very authoritatively told that not on that list was Al Gore. And Bill was on the list."

Scott Snyder, a North Korea expert for the nonprofit Asia Foundation, said Clinton's standing as a world statesman carried weight with Pyongyang.
"The North Koreans have a lot of nostalgia for the end of the Clinton administration," he said.

"The question is going to be how could he go to Pyongyang without some assurance that they would be released," Snyder said. "For someone at his level to go without a prior assurance of some kind would be to risk a huge loss of face."

Clinton at 62 looks older than the boy president who dominated American politics in the 1990s, but he remains more robust than most men his age and full of intellectual energy. His left hand trembled a little bit during dinner, as it tends to do late in the day. It worried him enough at one point that he had himself tested for Parkinson’s disease, but the results came back negative; his doctor says he has just signed too many autographs over the years. When I mentioned that he had to get hearing aids during his White House tenure because of the effects of too many campaign rallies, he cheerfully pulled out the latest equipment from his ear and showed off how sleek and virtually invisible it was.

We Americans dwell in a consumer plutocracy, and the plutocrats don't even bother to be cute about it any more. Barack Obama, hailed by the geniuses of new media as a populist saviour, has surrounded himself with a team that was already bought and paid for by the financial services industry before they ever walked into the White House.

It's well-documented that Clinton is no angel either but he remains a rock star of the Democratic Party and was the headliner at the festival, hosted by the Aspen Institute.

He filled the Greenwald Pavilion with more than 700 high-powered attendees who greeted him with an extended standing ovation. Clinton's daughter, Chelsea, was seated next to Gen. Colin Powell front and center.

Much of Clinton's remarks centered on the Africa election in Zimbabwe, calling for Robert Mugabe either to step down or "form a power-sharing arrangement with his chief opponent."

He didn't mention Hillary or the Democratic nomination for President, but he had this to say about John McCain and Barack Obama on environmental policy: [More...]

Nearly half of Democrats (48 percent) think Hillary Clinton has a better chance of beating John McCain in November — 10 percentage points higher than the 38 percent who think Barack Obama can win, according to a FOX News poll released Wednesday. This represents a significant shift from March, when Democrats said Obama was the candidate more likely to beat McCain.

Democrats continue to favor Clinton as their party’s leader, albeit narrowly: 44 percent want her to win the nomination and 41 percent want Obama. Last month Clinton was preferred by 2 percentage points.

There's also an NBC/WSJ poll out taken of all voters, not just Dems. It finds Bush is a liability to McCain and Obama's "bitter" remarks cost him in favorability, as did Rev. Wright.

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, the nation's only Hispanic governor, is endorsing Sen. Barack Obama for president, calling him a "once-in-a- lifetime leader" who can unite the nation and restore America's international leadership.

"I believe he is the kind of once-in-a-lifetime leader that can bring our nation together and restore America's moral leadership in the world," Richardson said in a statement obtained by the AP. "As a presidential candidate, I know full well Sen. Obama's unique moral ability to inspire the American people to confront our urgent challenges at home and abroad in a spirit of bipartisanship and reconciliation."

Richardson could be angling for the V.P. Spot. He could also take Hispanic votes from Hillary. [More...]

On a campaign swing through East Texas on Friday, Bill Clinton said over and over that he has nothing against Barack Obama.

"I'm not against anybody," he told an overflow crowd in the student center at Tyler Junior College. "I'm for Hillary." Later, he added: "If you disagree, you have another very attractive choice."

The former president, admitting that Texas looms as a make-or-break state for Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential hopes, scrupulously avoided attacks on Mr. Obama – attacks of the type for which he was roundly criticized after the Jan. 26 South Carolina primary.

Just back from Bill Clinton's appearance at the historic Stock Pavilion on the University of Wisconsin Campus. When Gary Storck and I approached, we were directed across the street by the most polite pair of Secret Service agents I've ever dealt with, but, as it's a narrow street, not an unreasonable "Free Speech Zone."

Our signs referred to Bill's encounter, as a Candidate, with Jacki Rickert of Mondovi, Wisconsin in 1992. Jacki had been approved for the federal medical marijuana program, but not yet admitted when Bush I closed the program to new admissions in 1989. She caught up with Bill in Osseo on his post-Convention Mississippi River bus tour. After she explained her odyssey through the federal bureaucracy, Bill "I feel your pain" promised "When I'm President, you'll get your medicine."

Come the Inaugural, Jacki sent letters, made calls seeking fulfillment of that commitment, but got back only form letters. "If drugs were legal, my brother Roger would be dead."